


All at Sea

by dissembler



Category: Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Dancing as Foreplay, Historical Gay Subcultures & Meeting Places, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Oral Sex, Pastiche, References to Situational Homosexuality, Restraint Exercised on the Part of the Author In Refraining From Using 'Ejaculated' As a Speech Tag, Victorian Attitudes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:55:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23945065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dissembler/pseuds/dissembler
Summary: Watson follows Holmes into the dark and finds illumination.
Relationships: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Comments: 8
Kudos: 54
Collections: Id Pro Quo 2020





	All at Sea

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sombregods](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sombregods/gifts).



_Doubtless, in the course of the memoirs and tales of my adventures with Sherlock Holmes that I have had published, I have already said too much and certainly have said enough that a man of certain leanings might come to not altogether incorrect assumptions of the true nature of my relationship with my dear friend Sherlock Holmes. I will say for myself, however, that I was almost entirely unaware of the depth of my own feeling, and utterly ignorant of Holmes’, until the events of the night that I will relay below put me through an overdue bout of self-discovery. That this account will never see the light of day nor any eyes but mine goes without saying, but I have grown used to writing my adventures down and would feel remiss in leaving this one out of that treatment as if it were something worthy of the shame the world cruelly heaps upon it._

_J.H.W. 188-_

–––––––––

I could have had no inkling, when the evening in question began, as to where I would end up. I had just returned from running several errands, picking up packages and medical supplies that I had been running low on, and so was positively laden with boxes and bundles when I returned to Baker street to find my friend, his face angled so that I could not see it, practically dashing past me and out of the open door behind me. 

Dropping my parcels in one of the hall chairs, I stuck my head out and called after him: “Holmes, wherever are you going this late?” 

Night had fallen just as I had gotten into a cab outside my favourite supplier near Harley Street and, even in the queer respite London was enjoying from the noxious fog, Baker Street was dim and gloomy with the moon half-covered by cloud.

Holmes gave no answer, merely waving a long gloved hand behind him rather dismissively. I turned, perplexed to find Mrs Hudson had appeared beside me. 

“He received a runner whilst you were out, Doctor. The young man didn’t stay long but once he had left Mr Holmes was up and around the rooms – I could hear him crashing about for something – and then he’s calling from the top of the stairs that I should tell you not be alarmed if he did not return tonight but to kindly fetch a constable if he is not returned by dinnertime tomorrow.”

Though I confess such a request was not uncommon in my companion, it nevertheless left me unhappy in the knowledge that, as close as we had become in our years sharing rooms, he did not need me. Perhaps what I did next was foolish, and it was certainly not done with wholly noble intentions, but I can never as long as I live regret it for what it led us to: I left Mrs Hudson with an untidy hallway and followed Sherlock Holmes into the deepening dark.

–––––––––

After only ten minutes of rather brisk walking in the direction Holmes had set off in, I caught sight of the instantly recognizable figure and unmistakable stride continuing down Baker Street and now sought to follow him without arousing his suspicion.

Though it was a daunting task, and to be sure I would never dare to rank myself alongside my friend in the acts of surveillance, I flatter myself that I have picked up certain skills while in his company. I stayed on his side of the road and maintained a distance but not a steady one, as matching him footfall for footfall would have had him alert to my presence in an instant, and as we walked past Portman Square and got onto Orchard Street I remained even further back, only watching to see which way he would turn when he reached that vital artery of London: Oxford Street. 

He turned left and, again, I gave him several moments’ grace before turning that way myself. 

As this is for no-one but myself I will allow my narrative a brief interjection: I am sure my reader thinks that I ought to have been caught by now, and so I will take the opportunity to stress that Holmes and I were far from the only persons abroad at this hour and in this fashionable part of London. Oxford Street at night is lit extremely well and always bustling with all sorts of persons coming and going from and to restaurants before heading off to see plays in Piccadilly or whatever else they saw fit to do with their evenings. The roads from where we had been to where we were now were well travelled. Thus ends my interjection.

I continued to follow Holmes along Oxford street, maintaining my distance and watching him closely to try and work out what was leading him here. I had not had time to interrogate Mrs Hudson any further about the young man who had visited our rooms and so could not use any clues from that. I only knew that a young man was involved somehow, and that my companion and I were venturing towards Soho, and in hindsight that ought to have put me in some idea of where I was unwittingly heading. At the time, however, I remained in the dark and not knowing that illumination was close at hand.

When we had almost reached Tottenham Court Road, Holmes made a sudden turn and I must confess that I very nearly lost him. Only the sound of raised voices carrying from a side street, one voice of which I would recognise anywhere as his, led me to walk a little down Berwick Street to find my friend. The moon had freed herself from the clouds and I could see quite clearly that he was being held rather roughly by the arm by a policeman, who looked up when I approached whilst my friend seemed to stiffen, and kept his face turned away from me.

“I say, unhand that gentleman,” I began rather sharply. “Do you not know who that is?”

The policeman sneered at my words before turning his face back to my friend. “I warrant I’ve caught myself a molly,” he said, his voice loud and vicious. He smiled horribly as he looked back at me: “Are you here to up my tally?”

It was, I am embarrassed to say, only at the policeman’s insinuation that I put the two and two of the young man and a night trip to Soho together in my mind to make the logical four, and then I was so flabbergasted that I could not speak. The very implication, resting as it did on evidence that I myself would likely have believed, was such that I stewed in impotent anger, my face hot, as I tried to drag words together to refute it. To add to this I was afraid: _I_ knew that I was not here to solicit nor to be solicited but I knew that, however unlikely I thought it to be, I could not say the same about my friend with absolute certainty and maintain myself honest. Surely his silence as the policeman levelled such accusation was damning? Why wasn’t he speaking?

Desperately, in the end, I decided not to address his accusation. Instead I loudly told him who it was he held. “The man you are restraining is Sherlock Holmes, the consulting detective!”

The policeman turned from me to look at my friend again, though I still could not do the same. I did not understand why, even now, with my seeing his body and the back of his head clearly and bound to see the rest of him at any moment, he would not let me see his face.

Asked to confirm his identity, Holmes finally spoke. “Indeed I am,” he said simply, and when nothing else seemed forthcoming I rushed to add: “You are impeding us on a case, my good man. Let us about our business and we will say nothing to your superiors.”

“Us?” the policeman scoffed. “You weren’t walking together. Maybe the great man of Baker Street is a filthy sodomite and you’re his jealous boy.”

At these words, Holmes straightened. “I can assure you, constable, that you are in error, and that I am in fact here for a case,” he said, his tone hard and sharp as steel. His face was still hidden from me but I fancy I can imagine his expression as he continued, “I can also assure you that, should you have any aspirations in the force, one word from myself or Dr. Watson here to our dear friend Inspector Lestrade will put paid to them with extreme prejudice.”

The constable hesitated, and as I saw his grip tighten around his truncheon I took two steps forward, hardly knowing I was doing so until he glanced at me and released my friend’s arm. He took a step back. 

“Apologies, sir,” he spat at Holmes and then, in tones of deep reticence, sounding like a malicious schoolboy chastened by a master, he said: “Is there anything I can do to assist you with your case?”

“Nothing but your absence and your word that you will not attempt to follow myself or Dr. Watson after you leave us,” my friend said. His tone was no longer icy and barbed but neither could I read anything into it; it was too bland, I felt sure that it hid something.

I found out what that something was when the policeman, with a huff and a few muttered words that I chose not to pick him up on, had left us, walking quickly the way I had come. My companion, finally, turned his face to me, and for a moment I was so entranced that I failed entirely to register the blaze in his eyes and the sharp tilt of his mouth that spoke of his great annoyance with me.

Holmes was made up, but it could not be called a disguise. There were no fake bushy eyebrows, his own black ones had instead been dragged through with kohl to sharpen them, and a white powder brushed underneath to make them appear even darker. There was no prosthetic nose: the aquiline, classical beauty of his own was untarnished, even as his nostrils flared in anger at me. What unmanned me most, however, were his cheeks and lips, the former of which had high spots of artificial colour so subtle that one unused to the pallor of my friend might even think were natural and the latter of which were slicked with a red that gave them a deep, bruised look. 

He was not at all made up to the effect that a woman would seek when painting, to enhance natural softness. Instead the paints and powders he had used served to make his looks more piercing, their magnetism more dangerous, and as I stared I was put into mind of a penny dreadful I had found in a bookshop years before. He looked like a vampire, and like a victim in a story I was mesmerized. I could not for the life of me tear my eyes away from his lips no matter their unfriendly cant.

“Watson,” he said but I had no response, I kept staring. His mouth opened a little and then closed, returning to its sharp expression. 

I cannot say how long I had been gazing openly at him before he turned his head and freed me for I do not know, and blush now to think of it, but when finally I met his eyes again he was very angry indeed. 

He shook his head, a strand of his usually firmly slicked back hair scything across his forehead. I tried not to focus on it; there we were, having just been accosted by a policeman’s false accusations of impure intentions, and I was looking at my friend in the very way that might confirm them. I tried to comfort myself with the thought that this was the very reaction he had been aiming for with his make-up, but I knew that he had not intended to elicit such a response from me and must surely have been horrified.

For a moment I feared he would call the constable back and I would find myself arrested but instead he said, “Watson, you have no idea how displeased I am that you are here, you may have ruined my plans.” 

Though relieved that his ire was wholly due to the case, I found that rather than being cowed by this I was instead very angry myself. Angry that he had left me out and that he had put me in this position, made me think...   
  
“Why did you not defend yourself against that constable and his ludicrous charges?” I demanded. 

“I did defend myself.”

I cast my eyes around and was gratified to see that the street was empty, the market stalls long shut up and the textile shops closed and empty. This was not an argument I wanted to have out of doors, but all the same I was too incensed with his actions to wait. I just could not comprehend what he had been playing at. “I don’t believe you would have done if I had not,” I levelled at him. “Were you content to be led away to the cells?”

Holmes shrugged his elegant shoulders, and I noticed for the first time that while he was dressed in his customary black, his cravat and linings were rich, deep coloured things that I had not seen before. “If you insist on pestering me I will answer that yes, I was content to be dragged off, but not, as you say, to the cells.”

“Where else would he have dragged you?” I asked, mired in confusion. 

“You misunderstand, as you commonly do,” the barb hit as intended but I refused to back down, “I was content to be led away from here at which point I would have revealed my identity and been allowed free.”

I blinked, absorbing his words, and then felt myself deflate; punctured by the simplicity. “You were going to let yourself be so abused in order to maintain cover?”

My friend, for I had to hope he still was and that this ruined blunder – far from the first – would not be the straw that broke our friendship, clicked his tongue in irritation. “Quite so,” he replied tersely. “But now any listeners are aware of who I am and who you are, and I must decide whether to risk continuing my mission or abandoning it.”

“I can only apologise, my friend,” I said, hanging my head, and I did not repeat his name to compound my error. I thought – I prayed – to see a slight softening of his gaze in response to that before it iced over again.

“Come along, then,” he said stiffly, and I was taken aback. Surely he did not intend to include me after my folly? But it seemed he did, for he set off down Berwick street without a further word, and I, uncertain still about so much, followed.

–––––––––

Holmes walked us in a circuitous manner, looping around Soho in an utterly insensible way, but I did not say anything. I merely followed, and as I did, I tried to convince myself that I was not an invert, but simply a man who had been so shocked to see his friend in rouge that he had not but to stare. I knew that my friend was beautiful, arrestingly so, but the acknowledgment of it was sexless, more akin to admiring a statue of Antinous in a museum than any proof of inversion. And of course, as a soldier and public school educated one to boot, I knew what men could do to one another, but that was a recourse only when presented with no female alternative. I was not, could not be, an invert. And yet I was following a man, who was by my own admission beautiful to me, into what I now knew must be a den of inversion. 

Eventually, Holmes took us down Wardour Street and we stopped before a public house with the certainly nondescript name of ‘The Ship.’ It was a common enough looking place, its glass windows frosted in the usual patterns and a hum of noise audible from within. One of each set of two doors was open, allowing occupants to spill partly onto the pavement. 

As a medical man, and, I should hope to be able to say honestly, a sane man, I know that there are no physical things that mark a man out as an Uranian. No matter what the scandal sheets say, one cannot look at a man and see well dressed hair, a well turned out suit, and a delicate hand and say ‘there! There is your sodomite.’ Accordingly, the pub’s main room was filled with a range of men of different sorts. At one table there was, indeed, a set of young aesthetes, and at another a group of working class men. Perhaps the very thing that would have damned the place, were a suspicious eye to glance in, was this variety; no ordinary pub can boast such a wide clientele. Holmes had run us in circles to ensure that our friend the constable, a very suspicious eye, would not find the place, and I was gratified to have it doubly confirmed that, whatever we were here for, he meant no harm to these men.

My friend swept through the bar room, myself following as usual, and brought up something from the pocket of his trousers, showing to a lazy looking man who was leaning next to a single door. The incognito doorman – for I should have taken him for any ordinary patron, dressed as he was in a simple workman’s suit – looked Holmes and I up and down and then nodded, stepping aside to let us through into the next room.

It has taken me rather a long time to decide how to put into words how I felt upon entering the back room of that establishment. My immediate reaction was relief that my friend had not brought me to a brothel, but after that had subsided and I focused on my surroundings, I found myself instead filled with a strange trepidation. It was as if I had stepped off from the real world I knew and into a wholly new one without ever leaving London. I was at once excited and terrified. 

The room was not overly large, the same width as the bar room though deeper and without the booths and tables. There was a small bar in the corner, with one smiling barman polishing glasses behind it, and a small raised dais at the other end upon which stood an upright piano being played by a handsome man with bouncing blond curls. The rest of the space was given over to a sea of men, dancing. 

I must have gasped, for Holmes looked back at me with an arched eyebrow before turning back to cut a path through the waltzing couples to the bar. Again, without a word I followed him. 

Once we had removed our coats and Holmes had ordered us two gins, despite the fact that gin was neither of our poisons of choice, I asked him in hushed tones what we were doing here. He smiled, though I saw it to be rather tight and without true humour, and brought a long, pale finger to his still rouged lips. I fought with myself again and, triumphing, managed to look away from him and out at the scene before me. It did nothing to settle me, and indeed set me on a path no less dangerous than Holmes’ make-up had dropped me in front of. Without compass or map I found myself lost between warring impulses. If I studied the dancing men, looked at their smiles and the ease of their touches, I could not help but think of my friend and the easy touches we normally shared – a hand to the other’s elbow or shoulder, walking arm in arm and even the less easy, frantic touches when the other was hurt – and attempting to convince myself that, surely, these were ordinary touches? I believed they were, and I still do believe it, but until that moment in that room of smiling, happy, dancing men, I had not come to accept that, while the touches were certainly not out of the ordinary, my reactions to those touches and the warmth and happiness I had felt when those hands were upon my person even for the smallest time were not. 

And, having come to this conclusion, I fretted. I had already, years ago accepted that I loved my friend, but I had thought it a brotherly love and had accordingly felt no shame in it. That love, and the way in which I had thought I had acknowledged his beauty, had been sexless. But now, with the remembered heat of his hands upon me – he had not touched me at all this night, I remember thinking then – and the image of his red lips seared into my mind, I saw our past tainted on my part with desire, an animal need. That was shameful, was it not? No matter the poetry: the vice of the Greeks was still a vice. Lusting after him, even if I had not known I had been doing so, was surely a guilty desire. But then I thought: the men in the back room were not guilty, nor ever would I wish to see them put in front of a court and told they were so. And I would never wish to see them shamed, either. Could I not extend the courtesy of such acceptance to myself? 

I turned back to my companion and once again marked the rigidity he had carried since I had caught up with him. He lounged constantly and I had grown very capable of spotting the differences between his being in true comfort and his acting that part. Even if I could accept myself as an invert, I wondered if he could? He had not called back the constable or taken me to task for my staring at him, though I was sure that he must have reached the true conclusion as to why much faster than I had myself. And of course, he was there, amongst men of that – of _my_ – leaning, and though I was still in the dark as to his purpose there I felt certain that he did not mean the men harm. After all, he had led us on a merry run around the streets to protect the establishment from the constable. Perhaps, then, he did not wish to be thought an invert himself? But of course his posture was still louche, his face still painted, and I am not so much an imbecile as to miss the meaning of that. It stood to reason, then, with all else as I could see it discarded as options, that his discomfort was because of me. 

The conclusion I had reached hurt me more than I can say, and I had just about consigned myself to melancholy, considering whether I should order myself another gin in which to drown, when Holmes stood away from the bar. He turned to me and bade to wait where I was and then, as he went to move from me I saw it, a half-step hesitation before he left my side. 

Anyone who has ever been in love will know that, once one has admitted it to oneself, one looks for every possible sign of it in the object of one’s affections. My heart, which I cursed at the time for a fool, soared at that small step back and I placed upon it no end of favourable meanings. He did not wish to leave me, I thought, and therefore he cannot be repulsed by me, and as I watched him wend his way through the crowd I revisited the memories of the casual touches that I had found to have in reality moved me more than I knew. Had he felt the same? He had certainly initiated his share of those touches and had never flinched from them save on a few understandable occasions when, like a wounded animal, he had retreated. Was it purely wishful thinking to suggest that his discomfort had at its root, sprung from the same place mine had? I hoped it was not and promised myself that, if I gained no answer before we were returned to Baker Street, I would be brave enough to ask him out right and to face whatever consequences that incurred.

So decided, I turned my attention back to my friend as he reached the dais I have mentioned. Holmes stepped up onto it and leant down to whisper something to the smiling pianist. Surprised, I wondered if perhaps he were requesting a tune to be played but, at whatever my friend had said to him, the pianist’s smile fell before he nodded. Then I watched Holmes withdraw, turning to make his way back to me, and the pianist beckoned to the closest dancing couple. 

As the couple went to the pianist my friend settled back at my side. He did not look at me, nor say anything to me, but I clung to the hope that he merely was afraid, just as I was. When I returned my eyes to the pianist and the couple, I saw the couple separate. They moved through the crowd in a way that reminded me of my experience hearing of battle plans, covering escape routes, and then they converged upon a thin, tweedy man who had been leaning against the wall. They grabbed him by the arms and took him away through a door at the very rear of the room.

My friend’s voice broke through my attempts to divine what was happening. “You had noticed, of course,” he said, and to his credit his voice was very nearly what it usually was when he said such things, “that we were not the only persons here refraining from the dance?”

I had not noticed, and as I believed he knew that, I did not give him the satisfaction of confirming it. Instead I made a guess: “That man is a blackmailer, I presume?”

“The very lowest of his kind,” he confirmed. “A blackmailer who preys upon members of the society to which he himself belongs.”

Though of course I appreciated the cruelty of the man’s actions I could not help but worry. “I hope they are not going to hurt him, Holmes.”

My friend turned upon me with a jagged smile I did not understand. “They may indeed hurt him a little, but his life is not in danger.” He turned to the barman and muttered something I barely heard, preoccupied as I was with the door they had taken the blackmailer through. He then turned back to hand me my coat. “Now, I believe it is time for us to leave.”

–––––––––

I followed Holmes to Regent’s circus, quiet and contemplative. I trusted my friend that the man’s life was safe but I did not like to think of what violence he was likely at this moment being subjected to. 

Noticing my mood, Holmes stopped us at the kerb under a lamp. “The men you saw lead the blackmailer away have a right to be angry with him,” he said softly. For the first time that night I could not detect any tension there and found that instead it seemed to have been replaced with a thin note of what sounded like resignation. I studied his face in the gaslight as he continued, “But they will not kill him: Ambrose, the pianist, would not stand for that. They took him out of the room to restrain him whilst the place emptied, so that once free he could not run immediately to the closest constable and enact revenge on them. Are you satisfied?”

At my nod he turned back to the road and began waving and hallooing for the nearest hansom to take us the rest of the way home. I remained quiet, adding that awful smile of his to my calculations and trying to make it fit. In no time at all we were back in Baker Street.

Mrs Hudson having gone to bed, I divested myself of my coat as quietly as I could. Holmes did not wait for me, taking the stairs with his usual large strides as I hung back. 

Now that the moment had come I was afraid again, unsure of how to broach the subject, and when I climbed the stairs myself I did so slowly. 

I found him smoking, standing in the centre of the living room and once again my eyes immediately fell to his lips. I tried to take strength from the fact that he had not yet removed the rouge.

When he saw me enter he removed his pipe and looked at me almost sadly. “I apologise for exposing you to that place,” he said, dropping his gaze to the carpet between us. “I should have sent you home and gone alone.”

Be brave, I told myself. “I would not have gone,” I said. “And, in point of fact, I am glad that I was able to see such a place.”

His dark head snapped up, and I thought that he looked as I felt, a real fear in his eyes as they bored into mine. “What do you mean?” he whispered.

I forced myself to take one step, two, towards him and let out a breath I had not known that I was holding when he made no move to retreat from me. I continued forward until I was within a hand’s breadth of his body. The body that I now knew I wanted so badly.

As I looked up into the eyes I loved so well, at the face I had found beguiling even without the paint, my friend took in a shallow breath. His eyes danced between meeting mine and darting down to my own lips, and I will forever remember the sound of my heart in my ears as my eyes fell shut and I closed the scant distance between our mouths.

I am hardly without experience as far as kissing, and indeed many things else, are concerned but I confess that in that moment I stood paralysed with fear until I felt his lips move against mine. One of his hands came up to curl over the side of my face, his long fingers pushing through the hair behind my ear as he swept his thumb across my jaw. With his other hand he pulled me against him, splaying his fingers beneath my jacket and against my waistcoat, pinning me in place. I gasped against his lips at the possessiveness of the gesture and felt him smile before he pulled back.

“I had hoped,” he began, and most unlike him he trailed off. 

“So had I,” I told him frankly. I brought my own hand up to trace a line down his sharp cheekbone to his lips. “Forgive me, dear boy. I fear I have been rather obtuse for some time.”

His eyes took on a dark, glazed look and he opened his mouth ever so slightly. The warmth of his breathing against my fingertip threatened to undo me, and I moved my hand out of the way to kiss him again, more desperate than the last. 

We ravished each other’s mouths, not stopping until the need for air became too much.

“I fear the same may be said of me,” Holmes said between ragged breaths, and then he favoured me with a smile sweeter than any I had ever seen of him. “Would I be correct in assuming that thanks are owed to Ambrose and his establishment?” he asked, teasingly.

I shook my head, though of course thanks were due to that place. “Thanks are due to your lips,” I said with a wide smile, “and to the rouge you used. Though, since you mention it, it is a pity we never got to dance at Ambrose’s.” 

His eyes flashing as he grinned, Holmes pulled his hand from my hair and, instinctively, I brought my own up to meet his, his fingers entangling with mine. I brought my other hand to his shoulder and then he pulled me into a simple waltz, our form poor with our arms barely extended, turning us around in the little space that we had.

Unable to help myself, a bright peal of laughter broke free of me and I buried my face in the crook of his neck to stifle myself, feeling his frame shake in response with laughter that he, wisely, could keep quiet. 

It will not go down in history as the most graceful, nor even the most charged dance but I shall never forget the thrill of having that body, which had been just as close to me before, pressed against mine in the light of our new understanding. It certainly will not go down in history as the longest dance, for after what can only have been five or so delirious minutes, Holmes stopped us to kiss me again.

“Will you let me take you to bed, dear Watson?” he murmured, leaning his forehead against mine. “We needn’t do much of anything, but I really must touch you. I have wanted to touch you all night.”

I could do nothing in that moment but nod, rendered utterly mute by the roughness of his voice as he had said the very thing I had been hoping would be said, and he led me up to his room by the hand he had been holding as we had danced. 

When he let me go in order to strike a match and light two candles – his curtains were already drawn, a forethought the both of us remain grateful for – I had only a moment to feel bereft before he was back against me. He walked me back to his bed and pushed me down onto it with the lightest of shoves though he needn’t have expended any effort at all for I felt as if a feather could have knocked me down in that moment. 

“Oh, my Watson,” he said then, sinking gracefully down onto his knees before me. “Will you let me suck you?” To emphasise his request he reached forward and pressed his palm against the obscene bulge at my crotch making me buck up, needing pressure against my already mostly hard prick. 

I half feared what I would sound like should I have spoken, and so wordlessly I nodded my assent, gasping as his clever fingers made quick work of my fly. With his other hand he stroked up the inside of my thigh, trailing heat behind his fingers and setting my skin ablaze beneath my trousers. 

I am not a proud man by nature, but I confess that I have often received with immense satisfaction the responses of my partners to my prick. I was gratified to see that Sherlock Holmes’ reaction was no different. In fact, I felt a deeper satisfaction at the way his eyes widened and his mouth dropped open a fraction, for I know that even before he had me on his bed he had known my measurements. 

His large hand closed around me and I bit my lip to keep from shouting, helplessly shifting my hips forward into his grasp only to find his other hand pressing me down. 

“God,” I uttered, staring at the dark ceiling as if looking for salvation from the torment of his hand when in fact I had to look away for fear of spilling altogether too early as he gave me two brisk tugs. “Holmes, I beg of you.”

“Anything,” he said, and his tone was so guileless that I had to see his face. He was gazing up at me with hooded eyes, his blasted mouth open and wet and wanton. The sight took my breath away, and something in my face must have affected him just as deeply, for he surged up to kiss me, clutching at the back of my neck to ensure that I could not resist. As if I ever would resist him, I thought, and smiled against his desperate lips. 

“Anything,” he repeated, and, in a motion far quicker than I should ever have been able to muster in such a haze of lust, he ducked down to engulf the head of my prick in his warm, wet mouth. 

I pressed my eyes closed, my hands taking fistfuls of his bedsheets and clinging on for dear life. Perhaps the only regret I have for the entire night is that I kept my hands to myself for so long when I should have had them in his glorious hair. I came to my senses on that score when he drove down, drawing my prick fully into his throat before dragging himself back again, and the sweet constriction had me burning to touch him in return. I sunk the fingers of one hand into his hair and with the other I clung to his shoulder. 

Having such a man kneeling before me, enveloping me with the wet glide of his throat as he moved back and forth to suck me, was a heady thing indeed and I could not have lasted any longer than I did. When I felt the moment of my climax coming I pushed at his shoulder, unable to verbalise but feeling that in some way I must warn him. Holmes did not pull away, as I had thought he might, but rather hummed around my prick and with that my paroxysm came upon me in a torrent of bliss. 

While I recovered from my transports, my friend stood, still miraculously capable of incredible grace of movement. I looked up at him, and I am sure the look on my face must have been one of embarrassing sentiment, for Holmes extended his hand to graze a fingertip over my cheek. 

“Thank you, dear boy,” he said hoarsely and I am sure I gaped at him in shock. The bulge in his own trousers was practically at my eye level and, though in my experience with my own sex, the man offering his mouth usually brought himself off in his fist during the act, I found myself glad of his restraint for it meant I could give back the pleasure he had so kindly given me. 

“You thank me prematurely,” I told him, my own voice scratchy and rough. I put my hands out and took hold of his narrow waist, resting my thumbs just above the band of his trousers.

“You mustn’t feel you have to,” he said, after a sharp intake of breath and I smiled at him, shaking my head ever so slightly.

“Holmes,” I said firmly, “I scarce want anything more,” and down onto the bed I pulled him, where we stayed until daybreak and from whence we crept blinking into a new chapter of our acquaintance.

**Author's Note:**

> (The Ship is a real Victorian pub in Wardour Street, tho as far as I'm aware it doesn't have any fun gay history.)
> 
> Hope you enjoy this, sombregods! I had a fab time reading through the Gay London section of my bookshelf for it lol so thanks to Peter Ackroyd.


End file.
